Mukasey sworn in as attorney general

Source: USA Today

Just in: One day after winning Senate confirmation, retired federal judge Michael Mukasey has been sworn in as the nation's 81st attorney general.

Read more: http://blogs.usatoday.com/ondeadline/2007/11/mukasey-sworn-i.html

:sarcasm:

11NOV2007 NPR / WEEK IN REVIEW / SUNDAY - NPR Senior News Analyst/sage Daniel Schorr said Mukasey responded to Senator Patrick Leahy: "The Constitution authorizes the President to ignore or disobey statutory law when he thinks it necessary to defend the Country."

After the Cold War, citizens trusted elected leaders and national security professionals to guard against and prevent attacks like 9/11: THEY failed. How do Americans now trust the same leadership to fix the problem, when essentially the same leaders led us down the wrong road in the first place?

No doubt, America has enemies. Like it or not, the reasons—how and why we got to where we are—don’t seem to matter much, anymore: there are enemies who have demonstrated motive and means to kill Americans. It is also true, bombings in the UK and Spain et al prove international terrorists can be living right next door.

And if that's not enough, think about school shootings, the war zone in Compton, and the fact that Americans spend over $66B on recreational drugs, financing drug/gangsta terrorism and oppression in nest countries. The Spain train bombers funded their terrorist operation thru the sale of ecstasy and meth. Come on now, progressives! Think about it! You wonder why the hard right authoritarians get support from those willing to remain reticent on Constitutional compromise. Even paranoids have real enemies.

Of course, there is sufficient reason to question Mukasey's take on the theory of Constitutional (unitary executive) law-breaking authority. Wes Clark has stated he saw a memo a few years back outlining the plan to replace governments in seven countries in five years: Iraq, Iran, Syria, Jordan, and others. (Goto his talk at the Commonwealth Club in October.) Has the reaction to pre-emptive strike, get-tough shock ‘n awe spawned a convenient excuse for gutting the Constitution? Has “…either you’re with us or against us…” polarized enough Americans to hand-off rights of privacy?

After the Soviet collapse, national security think-tankers correctly saw the need to stabilize danger zones. But “the plan” has been implemented by fools for other men (gender not implied)—their incompetence gave the world accelerated destabilization: just at the time when America should have demonstrated the best of Constitutional Democracy—freedom and liberty.

Are Americans willing to accept further abrogation of Constitutional Law - inalienable rights? How can we trust selective law-breaking in the hands of authoritarian ideologues? Are they deciders, or dividers? How do Americans trust leadership to fix the problem, when they're THEY responsible for flat-out taking us down the wrong domestic and foreign policy roads in the first place?

And the big question: Are corporations who have illegally gathered and disseminated privacy information exercising their patriotic sense of duty in these dark times; or are they serving up lists of legitimate American dissenters for future corrective action without having the foggiest notion or care how that information might be put to use? Is collected privacy information going to those in power who have thrown aside other laws, like the Geneva Convention, leaders who say torture is okay as long as God’s on our side?

If the Constitution authorizes the President to ignore or disobey statutory law when he thinks it necessary to defend the Country, can the President’s judgment be trusted to know when it is necessary to disobey statutory law?

If the Dan Schorr Mukasey quote is accurate, we are left wondering what the hell Democrats and Republicans sworn to uphold and defend the Constitution were thinking when Mukasey got his pass.

A rabid ideologue, and they can sometimes be scary and dangerous--he probably wants to get that guy slid away quietly somewhere, so he can't be pestered by bothersome investigators.

Ya just gotta wonder.

Introduce a bill to specifically criminalize waterboarding and other harsh interrogation techniques. Force the Republicans in Congress, Bush, and the Republican presidential candidates to support or oppose criminalizing these techniques. Is any such bill forthcoming? If it isn't, the Democrats are scoundrels and fools.

Or should that be resume?

I just found out that a step has been taken. Kennedy has introduced legislation to prohibit but (unless I'm mistaken) not criminalize waterboarding, etc. That's a step in the right direction but why not criminalize?

A crime parsed by torturous, but erroneous findings by pisspoor legal minds?

Let all Americans be proud that we can now torture prisoners shamelessly.

Here's an idea--how about a little rendition for Mukasey and all the fucking idiots that voted for him.

Schumer--"Should we reject him, it is almost certain that an acting, caretaker attorney general will take office without the advice and consent of the Senate. Inevitably, that would enable those in this Administration -- who do not believe in the rule of law and have done things that caused even former Attorney General Ashcroft to threaten resignation -- to have the complete upper hand."

Here's another idea--what's the fucking difference you fucking moron--Mukasey is Bush's "caretaker" attorney general who will also ignore the rule of law--and you, and the other Democratic idiots just gave him your consent.

Welcome "Alllyingwhores", it's a sad day when Ashcroft pales in comparison to his replacements.

Why did we bother electing a Democratic Congress? It is not i my nature to give up- I'm pretty tough but I really am at the edge of despairing of ever getting our country back.

of the country I used to know. Jefferson said something like "the man that trades his freedom for security deserves neither". Welcome to our fearless leaders...at this point, I hope every damn one is out on their asses next time around - the repugs for shamelessly creating this hell, the dems for their weak and quiet lack of substance in stopping it.

he actually run the place as the Department of Justice and not the Department of INjustice like the last 2 clowns is the real question.

"That Dark of the Moon thang is one of our Skull & Boner OCCULT techniques. Smirk, smirk, smirk. I would tell you more about why, but the real reasons are SECRET. Smirk, smirk, smirk."

- Commander AWOL, Skull & Boner Occult Brigade of republicon homelander chickenhawks